Harbin Festival | China's icy winter wonderland is back

The city of Harbin in China’s frigid northeast is hosting one of the world’s largest festivals featuring ice sculptures of animals, cartoon characters and famous landmarks.

The festival, which officially opened drew more than a million visitors, showcases the region’s tradition of snow and ice carvings as well as ice swimming in the Songhua River. Harbin’s temperatures can fall to minus 25 degrees Celsius. Harbin’s best ice and snow carvers have been busy putting the finishing touches to their sculptures, which are based on big chunks of ice that are dragged out of the nearby river and carved, brushed, and lit up.